Acid rain and climate change - Do these environmental problems have anything in common?

Hans Martin Seip

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Hans Martin Seip Cicerone 6/2001 Acid rain and climate change – Do these environmental problems have anything in common? Acid rain and climate change – Do these environmental problems have anything in common? Hans Martin Seip [Hans Martin Seip is a professor at the Department of Chemistry, University of Oslo, and researcher at CICERO. [e-mail]]. The current debate about efforts to mitigate global warming has certain parallels to the earlier controversy about reducing sulphur emissions. Are there any lessons to be learned from the debate about acid rain? As far back as 150 years ago there was already some speculation about possible human influence on the climate, and in 1896 Svante Arrhenius published the first quantitative calculation of how an increase in the CO concentration in the atmosphere would affect 2temperature. However, it has only been in the last ten or twenty years that the issue has been vigorously debated. Differing views on the importance of human activities have been expressed in the scientific literature, and, to a much higher degree, in mass media. For those who have been following the debate only superficially, the portrayal of these differing views has masked what is actually a fair degree of consensus among the great majority of scientists. This kind of polarisation is rather common when environmental issues are discussed and not particular to the climate debate. Negotiations about emissions reductions ...

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• Publié par: Lomif
• Nombre de lectures: 16
• Langue: English

Extrait

Hans Martin Seip

Cicerone

6/2001

Acid rain and climate change – Do these environmental problems have anything in common?

1

Acid rain and climate change –

Do these environmental problems have

anything in common?

Hans Martin Seip

[Hans Martin Seip is a professor at the Department of Chemistry, University

of Oslo, and researcher at CICERO.

[e-mail]

].

The current debate about efforts to mitigate global warming has certain parallels to the

earlier controversy about reducing sulphur emissions. Are there any lessons to be learned

from the debate about acid rain?

As far back as 150 years ago there was already some speculation about possible human

influence on the climate, and in 1896 Svante Arrhenius published the first quantitative

calculation of how an increase in the CO

2

concentration in the atmosphere would affect

temperature. However, it has only been in the last ten or twenty years that the issue has been

vigorously debated. Differing views on the importance of human activities have been

expressed in the scientific literature, and, to a much higher degree, in mass media. For those

who have been following the debate only superficially, the portrayal of these differing views

has masked what is actually a fair degree of consensus among the great majority of scientists.

This kind of polarisation is rather common when environmental issues are discussed and not

particular to the climate debate.

Negotiations about emissions reductions reveal strong conflicts of interest, both within

Norway and within and between other countries. This has been illustrated very clearly in the

process of negotiating the Kyoto Protocol. This article takes a look at another environmental

problem, acid deposition, to see if any lessons can be learned from the way this problem was

managed.

Acid deposition – the Norwegian SNSF project

The famous British scientist Robert Angus Smith studied the effects of acid precipitation in

the 19

th

century and first used the expression “acid rain” in 1872. A few years later the

Norwegian scientist Waldemar Christopher Brøgger found evidence of long-range transport

of pollutants. In a note in

Naturen

(1881) he discussed the origin of a grey snowfall in

Hans Martin Seip

Cicerone

6/2001

Acid rain and climate change – Do these environmental problems have anything in common?

2

Norway. He writes:

The most likely explanation seems therefore to be that the black

substance mainly containing coal ash originated in a larger city or industrial district where

the atmosphere is known often to be strongly polluted by smoke from chimneys etc.

Beginning around 1900 there were reports of fish deaths that could have been caused by

poor water quality. In 1959 the Norwegian biologist Alf Dannevig suggested that long-range

transported sulphur pollutants could cause acidification and kill fish in Norwegian bodies of

water. The Swede Svante Odén described possible effects of acid deposition on soils and

water in a famous paper published in 1968. A paper by Gene E. Likens and co-workers

published in 1972 spurred discussions of effects in North America.

An increasing number of lakes and streams in Norway were reported to be acidic in the

1960s, and there was concern about possible effects on forests. This resulted in a large

interdisciplinary Norwegian research project,

Acid Deposition – Effects on Forest and Fish

(Sur nedbørs virkning på skog og fisk, SNSF) that lasted from 1972 to 1980. Originally the

intention was to focus on effects on forests, but soon the interest in water acidification and the

accompanying biological impacts was at least as great.

When the SNSF project arranged a conference and presented preliminary conclusions in

1976, it initiated a heated debate with Ivan Th. Rosenqvist, professor in geology at the

University of Oslo, as the leading critic of the project. He argued that the acidity of the

precipitation was of little significance for the acidity of lakes and streams. Processes in the

catchment were much more important. Changes in land-use (for example, abolition of

summer mountain farms which led to increased forest growth) had resulted in soil

acidification, which in turn caused water acidification. Rosenqvist got support from other

scientists, particularly from the universities. Gro Harlem Brundtland, who was Minister of the

Environment at that time, strongly opposed Rosenqvist’s views and called his criticism a

“køpenickiade”, which probably is best translated as ”bluff and bluster”. Rosenqvist parried

that he only wanted to save Norwegian scientists from making fools of themselves.

Who was right? During recent years many bodies of water in southern Norway have

become less acidic, and there is little doubt that the main reason is reduced sulphur emissions

in Great Britain and on the continent. Similar observations have been made in other areas

where waters had become acidified, but not in all. However, effects of acid deposition on

forests are still not clear. In some areas with very high concentrations of SO

2

(the most

important precursor of acid rain) there is clear evidence of forest damage. There have been

improvements in the forest conditions in Poland and to some extent in the Czech Republic

recently; this

may

be related to lower air pollution. In areas with more modest deposition of

acidifying compounds there is no clear connection between acid precipitation and forest

damage. Reports about forest damage in the early 1980s in areas in the former West Germany

contributed strongly to an increased pressure for emission reductions. However, the serious

widespread forest damage feared by many at that time has fortunately never materialised.

Over the last ten years, there has actually been very little change in forest conditions in

Germany.

Hans Martin Seip

Cicerone

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Acid rain and climate change – Do these environmental problems have anything in common?

3

Environmental debates

How large were the differences in opinions about effects of acid deposition in Norway?

Rosenqvist and I made an attempt to answer this question in an article in the journal

Kjemi

in

1986. In fact there was close agreement on

what

processes were important, but disagreement

on the

quantification

.

The Norwegian debate had a parallel in North America. In 1983 Krug and Frink published

a paper in

Science

arguing that the deposition of the precipitation had little or no effect on the

acidity of bodies of water. A later article by Krug was entitled “The great acid rain flimflam,”

illustrating that the debate could become heated. In an article in

Chemistry in Britain

the

author used the term “garbled nonsense” about statements in one article by Saltbones and

Eliassen and one by me. Fortunately it was not difficult to show that the author had

misunderstood important points.

During the acid-rain debate, the mass media often announced that the Norwegian forest

was seriously threatened even though this lacked scientific basis. Today there are many

examples of the media stating that CO

2

emissions have no significant effect on climate,

basing their statements on arguments that have been refuted several times in the scientific

literature. Although these controversial statements may originate with scientists, the media are

to blame for splashing extreme viewpoints. Balanced discussions do not get great headlines.

However, it must be admitted that most scientists do not give popularisation of results high

priority.

SWAP – a joint British-Norwegian-Swedish project

British and Norwegian authorities came in conflict on the acid rain issue particularly since

Great Britain was the largest contributor of acidifying deposition in Norway. A few years

after the SNSF project was completed, a British-Scandinavian project,

Surface Waters

Acidification Programme

, was launched. The project was under the auspices of the Royal

Society and the Scientific Academies in Norway and Sweden. However, since the funding

came from the British coal and electricity industry, there was opposition to participation in

Norway and to a greater extent in Sweden where the word “bribes” was frequently used.

Finally, the Swedish and Norwegian academies agreed to participate. The project was a

success, partly due to a very competent British chairman of the Management Group. The

project ended in 1990 with conclusions that were very similar to those of the SNSF project.

Costs

In 1977, while the acid-rain debate was most heated, an editorial in

Nature

was titled

Million

dollar problem – billion dollar solution?

The author referred to estimated costs of lost fish

population in thousands of Norwegian lakes in the order of one million dollars, presumably

from the price of fish. The costs of reducing sulphur emissions were, on the other hand,

thought to be some 1000 times greater. The weakness in this reasoning was demonstrated a

few years later when Jon Strand (Department of Economics, University of Oslo) estimated the

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Acid rain and climate change – Do these environmental problems have anything in common?

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recreational value of angling in Norway to be 140 – 400 million dollars per year, a figure

which is very much greater than the commercial value of the fish.

Costs of damage resulting from global climate change are particularly uncertain. An

illustrative range of 18–46 ECU (1995) per tonne of CO

2

emitted has been suggested in the

ExternE project (Externalities of Energy). A large interval is not surprising; the uncertainties

in, for example, the spread of some diseases such as malaria are huge. At CICERO we have

emphasised that many measures aiming at reducing emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG)

also reduce emissions of other components (SO

2

, NOx, particles). This leads to less local

pollution and less acid rain and therefore reduced damage to health and environment. These

ancillary benefits (or co-benefits) may be much larger than the benefits from reduced GHG

emissions estimated as described above (see

Cicerone 6/98

and

6/01

). Additionally, these co-

benefits from measures reducing GHG emissions occur in the short term, in contrast to the

benefits related to climate which occur over a much longer time interval.

Trading with permits for GHG emissions is one of the mechanisms introduced in the

Kyoto Protocol to reduce costs of emission reductions. Trading has also been used for sulphur

dioxide emissions in the USA, where emissions declined by about 50% from 1985 to 1995.

The costs were considerably less than predicted before the enabling legislation (the Clean Air

Act amendments of 1990) was passed. In a letter to the editor printed in the Norwegian

newspaper

Aftenposten,

Geir Høyby claimed that trading with permits was the reason for low

costs. However, careful analyses have shown that this is not correct; it was more important

that the industries found other, unexpectedly cheap solutions to lowering sulphur emissions.

Lower transportation costs for coal seems to have played the greatest role, causing emitters to

switch to low-sulphur coal. Of course, one must not conclude from this experience that

trading with permits will not be important in efforts to reduce GHG emissions, but the sulphur

reduction example cannot be used as an argument for expecting good results from emissions

trading.

Is there something to learn from the acid rain experience?

The SNSF project gave Norwegian scientists experience in interdisciplinary research, which

is of great importance also in research on climate issues. There were periods of frustration,

but gradually the co-operation functioned well. Roll-Hansen and Hestmark have evaluated the

SNSF project. They stated that

one may now say with certainty that SNSF proved to be a

pioneer project of international importance

. They also pointed to the importance of scientific

competence and authority in the project management. Roll-Hansen and Hestmark claim that

there were occasionally conflicts, poor communication, and misunderstandings between

scientific experts on one hand and politicians and public representatives on the other – and

that this is a common phenomenon in environmental policy.

Roll-Hansen and Hestmark found that the Ministry of Environment greatly influenced the

development and content of the project and that this was somewhat disadvantageous. The

engagement of the Ministry was reflected in a Parliamentary bill (Stortingsproposisjon 172,

1974/75), which included a statement that generated much controversy:

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Acid rain and climate change – Do these environmental problems have anything in common?

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The original goal, to obtain base material for further

negotiations on the reduction of SO

2

emissions in Europe, is

still the main aim of the project.

This rather unfortunate formulation prompted, not surprisingly, accusations of

“predetermined” research. It is a dilemma that close contact with decision makers is

necessary, but at the same time there must be no reason to doubt the researchers’ integrity.

Scientists at CICERO have also from time to time been accused of being the mouthpiece of

the Ministry of the Environment. To avoid this, it is very important to make careful and

precise formulations. The decision makers must of course also accept well-founded results

even if they do not quite fit with the strategy at the time.

Experience from the acid-rain debate clearly illustrates the importance of an open dialog

between groups with different viewpoints. Even if Rosenqvist underestimated the importance

of sulphur emissions for the water quality in Norwegian bodies of water, he was right in

pointing out the complexity of the acidification process. In this way he greatly influenced

later research in this field. He showed clearly the importance of having a sound scientific

basis. Even though there may be no direct connection, the Intergovernmental Panel on

Climate Change (IPCC) seems well aware of this.

The SWAP project showed that scientists from different countries working closely

together tend to reach agreement on main points; such scientific agreement is likely also to

affect decision makers. The experience in the IPCC work seems to be similar.

Critics of generally accepted views on environmental problems often claim that they lack

equal access to the media, although periodically such deviating viewpoints seem to flourish in

mass media. Similar criticisms are also directed at the scientific literature; in scientific

journals, rejection of articles of poor quality may be perceived as censuring. However, it is

certainly important that serious criticism can be published without problems. The IPCC seems

to listen to criticism to a reasonable degree although some critics are not entirely satisfied.

Some environmentalists have been accused of irresponsibly promoting doomsday

prophecies. Although we need whistle-blowers, exaggerations are rarely a good policy. My

experience, after some 25 years of environmental research, is that to convince sceptics, one

should avoid strong statements based on questionable scientific evidence. In the long run,

scare mongering is likely to be detrimental for the struggle for a better environment. In

general the IPCC has been careful in pointing out uncertainties, but this is seldom clear in

reports in mass media.

The Norwegian role in international environmental

negotiations

Already in 1979 the

ECE Convention on long-range transboundary air pollution

was signed

by 35 European countries, the USA and Canada. The convention recognised acid rain as a

problem, but did not include specific, binding undertakings to reduce emissions. The

convention was followed by several protocols with specified reduction targets. After some

time it was realised that emissions of several pollutants ought to be considered in an

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Acid rain and climate change – Do these environmental problems have anything in common?

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integrated way and the most recent protocol from 1999 specifies targets for emissions to air of

sulphur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, volatile organic compounds and ammonia. A further

extension to include particles may take place, while it is probably too optimistic to hope for

inclusion of GHGs, even though it might be advantageous to do so.

Norway undoubtedly played an important role in the efforts to reduce sulphur emissions in

Europe. Norway also strongly favoured NOx reductions and stated in 1988 that it intended to

have reduced these emissions by 30% in 1998 compared to 1986 emissions. However, this

goal was by no means reached; the emissions in 1998 were about the same as in 1986. It will

be interesting to see if Norway will be able to fulfil its obligations according to the 1999

protocol; this may turn out to be difficult both for organic and nitrogen compounds.

The Norwegian position in the negotiations for reduced sulphur emissions was clear. We

were likely to benefit substantially from an international reduction in sulphur emissions, while

the costs of reducing our own emissions were modest. This made it easy to think of ourselves

as environmental forerunners. Is this image still accurate? In contrast to acid rain, the costs for

Norway of mitigating global warming are likely to be significant, although not dramatic, and

the benefits more uncertain. Arguments used by Britain in the acid rain debate, that to some

extent were considered as delay tactics, such as the importance of reducing where the costs

were lowest, are major issues for Norway today. It is easy to make lofty statements about

environmental friendliness when the costs are low. But reductions in emissions of GHGs that

really help may be difficult without some change in lifestyle. However, it seems difficult to

gain acceptance for even minor changes in lifestyle in a way that would benefit the

environment.

References

Krug, E.C. and Frink, C.R., 1983. Acid rain on acid soil: a new perspective. Science, 221,

520-525.

Likens, G.E., Bormann, F.H. and Johnson, N.M., 1972. Acid rain. Environment, 14, 33-40.

Odén, S., 1968. The acidification of air and precipitation and its consequences in the natural

environment. Ecology Committee Bulletin, No. 1. Swedish National Science Research

Council, Stockholm.

Overrein, L., Seip, H.M. and Tollan, A., 1980. Acid precipitation – effects on forests and fish.

Final report of the SNSF project 1972-1980. Research report FR19/80, SNSF project.

Roll-Hansen, N., 1986, Sur nedbør – et storprosjekt i norsk miljøforskning. (Acid precipitation

– a major project in Norwegian environmental research.) The Norwegian Research Council

for Science and Humanities, Oslo.

Roll-Hansen, N. og Hestmark, G., 1990, Miljøforskning mellom vitenskap og politikk.

(Environmental research between science and policy.) The Norwegian Research Council for

Science and Humanities, Oslo.

Rosenqvist, I. Th. og Seip H. M., 1986. Reduser svovelutslippene. Forsurning av vassdrag –

hvor stor er uenigheten. (Reduce sulphur emissions. Acidification of surface waters - how

large is the disagreement) Kjemi nr. 3, 1986.

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Acid rain and climate change – Do these environmental problems have anything in common?

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Seip, H.M., 1993. Review of acid deposition-catchment interaction and comments on future

research needs. J. Hydrol. 142, 483-492. [Krug’s viewpoints are discussed in this paper.]

R. Southwood, 1990. Surface waters acidification programme. Management group final

report. Sci. Publ. Affairs, 5, 74-95.